House Manderly
House Manderly of White Harbor is a noble family in the north whose seat is the New Castle in the city of White Harbor. They are among the most powerful and loyal vassals of House Stark as well as the richest northern family due to their control of the only city in the region. Unlike most other northern houses, the Manderlys follow the Faith of the Seven instead of the old gods, as the family emigrated from the Reach after the Andal invasion. The Manderlys' blazon is a white merman with dark green hair, beard and tail, carrying a black trident, over a blue-green field. The Lord of White Harbor, influences all lands and houses east of the mouth of the White Knife, including Houses Locke, Woolfield, and Flint of Widow's Watch. The Manderlys' dominion includes the Sheepshead Hills and the Broken Branch, as well as the allegiance of Ramsgate. History Kingdom of the Reach The Manderlys are an ancient line who once lived along the banks of the mighty river Mander in the Kingdom of the Reach, and some claim the river was named after them. A noble house of great lords descended from the First Men, they held the castle of Dunstonbury as their seat and had a fierce rivalry with House Peake. During the reign of the Gardener kings in the Reach, King Gwayne III Gardener persuaded Lords Manderly and Peake to accept his judgment on their quarrel and do fealty for their lands, without any bloodshed. Like other houses of the Reach, the Manderlys presumably converted from the old gods of the First Men to the Faith of the Seven after the Gardeners welcomed Andals into their kingdom. Near the end of the long reign of King Garth X Gardener, a problem arose with the succession as the elderly and senile Garth had sired no sons and only daughters, one of whom had married Lord Manderly, and another to Lord Peake. Both lords were determined that their own wife should succeed to the throne, and the rivalry between them was marked by betrayal, conspiracy and murder, and finally escalated into open war with other lords joining the cause on both sides. The anarchy that followed lasted almost a decade until Ser Osmund Tyrell, the High Steward of Highgarden, made common cause with the other lords of the Reach and defeated the Peakes and Manderlys. Osmund then placed a distant cousin of the late Garth X on the throne as King Mern VI Gardener. Exile and White Harbor At some point, House Manderly overreached itself, and was driven from the Reach by the Gardener Kings. The exile of House Manderly is credited to Lord Lorimar Peake upon the behest of King Perceon III Gardener, who feared the Manderlys' growing influence and power in the Reach. This allowed House Peake to acquire the Manderlys' seat of Dunstonbury. The Manderly's were left sore, friendless and in peril of their lives. They fled north, and were welcomed by the Starks of Winterfell as their own bannermen. The Starks awarded the Wolf's Den to the Manderlys and tasked them with defending the White Knife in return for swearing an oath that they would always be loyal subjects of House Stark. This history instilled the Manderlys with great loyalty to their new liege lords. Recent History The Little War House Manderly was hit hard by the Iron Bank in the Little War, as White Harbor was seized and sacked by sellswords and sellsails, and Lord Manderly taken captive. Family Category:Noble House Category:The North Category:Kingdom of Winter